CHESS

CHESS; Ivanchuk Keeps His Cool Against the Speedy Anand

By Robert Byrne

Published: January 13, 2002

The matchup was the speedboy against the nervous neurotic.

The speed demon was Viswanathan Anand of India, who became FIDE World Champion last year; his opponent was Vasily Ivanchuk of Ukraine, whom everyone perceives as enormously gifted but liable to crack up in important situations. Anand was the odds-on favorite.

But Ivanchuk won. He was not intimidated by Anand's quickness and he kept cool under fire. After four draws in the regular and three in the tiebreak games, he won Game 8 and the match.

Anand's play was logy, uninspired. In the critical game, Ivanchuk saw a line of attack that Anand missed. He thus qualified for the FIDE World Championship Match, which starts Wednesday at the Hall of Columns in Moscow. He faces Ruslan Ponomariov, his Ukraine compatriot.

The development 3 Nc3 in the Sicilian is often used to avoid the Lasker-Pelikan-Sveshnikov Variation, 3 d4 cd 4 Nd4 Nf6 5 Nc3 e5 or the Kalashnikov, 3 d4 cd 4 Nd4 e5 5 Nb5 d6. But that does not explain Anand's 3 Nc3. He usually knows everything about the open variations of the Sicilian.

Ivanchuk took advantage of the move order to obtain a closed position with 3 . . . e5. This has been thought to discourage White's ambitions in the past, yet recently, White has enjoyed considerable success.